Lessons learnt in time
by fainelloth
Summary: Epilogue set 15 years after the End of Deathly Hallows. Harry's feelings about Snape, and a bit bout his life after Voldemort's death. DH Spoilers. Oneshot.


Disclaimer: I don't own anything.

N/V: After finishing book 7, I felt kinda...unsatisfied, so I decided to work on a little epilogue about what happened after the end of Deathly Hallows myself. DH Spoilers. Hope you enjoy reading it and I'd love to get some reviews ;)

English isn't my mother tongue, so excuse (and correct) wrong expressions and stuff like that... g

* * *

**Fifteen ****Years Later**

With a faint smile, Harry Potter left through the worker's exit at the Ministry of Magic. The week had been long and exhausting – together with the other Aurors they had finally managed to track down the insane vampire whose murders had caused them a lot of trouble in the past few weeks – and he was glad that the department head had decided to give them an extra holiday.

Stuffing his cloak in his briefcase, he walked down the deserted street, occasionally stopping to look at a shop window decorated with large and, in his opinion, rather maniacally grinning pumpkins, cobwebs and spiders. The muggle interpretations of witches and wizards sometimes displayed in there still amused him.

After checking his watch – the very same Mrs Weasley had given to him on his seventeenth birthday and had once belonged to Fabian Prewett – he decided to make a quick detour over Diagon Alley and the Leaky Cauldron before joining Ginny and the children for Halloween celebration.

"Good job, Harry!" a familiar voice exclaimed right behind him and Harry turned to see a grinning Dean Thomas, who was also working at the ministry, catching up with him. "T'was time you finally caught that guy, the Daily Prophet was making quite hysteria again…"

"Yeah, you'd think they'd had enough of that…" Harry said with a sigh. "But you know I hardly read the Daily Prophet anymore, anyways. They're printing quite a lot of rubbish – remember the story about that goblin mass murder which was, according to them, committed by a ministry official?"

Dean chuckled, then patted Harry on the shoulder and disapperated with a _plop_, leaving a thoughtful Harry behind. 

It was already past tea time when Harry marched through the front garden up to their house. He had spent most of his afternoon in Diagon Alley, buying magical sweets for the children and discussing random topics (such as, for example, the appointment of their once fellow student Zabini Blaise as new Transfiguration teacher at Hogwarts, after Professor McGonagall had finally gone into retirement) with a few old acquaintances he had met in the Leaky Cauldron.

Through the fancily decorated windows he caught a glimpse of Ginny who was busy cleaning the kitchen with a few swift movements of her wand. In the garden he could hear the voices of James and Albus, their eldest sons, who were apparently arguing over a toy broomstick.

"I will tell Dad", said Albus in a weepy voice. "He will lock you up in the cupboard if I tell him!"

"Then I will tell Dad 'bout who locked up _Lily_ in the cupboard last week!" James replied with a sneer. He had turned eight a month ago – one year older than Albus - and never missed a chance to play tricks on and crow about his younger brother. Albus, in his turn, tried his best to compete with him, even although – Harry had to smile at this thought – he was already hopelessly outmatched by their youngest daughter Lily.

As always when he was close to his family, a strange mix of emotions rushed through Harry. Even after all those years it still felt like a miracle; knowing that there was a home he could return to each day, a family for whom he could care and who cared about him. It was a warm, comforting thought.

When Harry entered the kitchen, Ginny gave him a cheerful smile and kissed him swiftly, before going on with her work.

"Seems like you had a good day at work today?" she said, looking slightly envious, and Harry felt a little bit guilty for still working as an Auror when she had given up her job to care for the children. "Ron was here a few hours ago and told me that you two finally managed to catch that guy." She smiled again. "He and Hermione invited us to their place to celebrate Halloween with them."

"Oh, that's nice", Harry replied without sounding too convincing. He was looking forward to meeting his two best friends who were now living with their family in London - Hermione said she could not stand living in a small village and it suited Ron with his job as a fellow Auror at the ministry – but, and he was almost ashamed to admit it to himself, there was something he had to do. Maybe he was being superstitious, but it was like a sleeping ghost that would haunt him each year in the night of the thirty-first October unless …

"That's okay, Harry… I told them you will probably come later" he heard Ginny say, her voice full of understanding, and he looked up at her with gratitude.

Without Ginny, he knew for sure, he would never have been able to live a fairly normal life, even (or especially) after Voldemort's downfall; with her, the events from his past seemed less haunting and easier to accept. There was no need to explain. Ginny simply understood. The experiences they shared, and which no one else could ever share with them, were a bond between them, stronger maybe than even love. 

The sky was already dark, and a few lonely stars were glittering, when Harry apparated in the deserted alley right in front of an old fashioned kissing gate. His breath came in clouds; autumn was giving way to winter. The night air was cool and damp, filled with the scent of moist leaves and rain.

For a few seconds he stood listening in complete silence. In the distance, beyond the graveyard, he could see the faint glow of streetlights that were marking the village of Godric's Hollow.

Almost without a sound, Harry pushed the kissing gate open and stepped in. A rough, slippery path led to the doors of a seemingly ancient church built of white stones. Old and crooked trees were towering like frozen giants over both sides of the path, the ground surrounding them already covered by fallen leaves. Behind the church, he could see the black silhouettes of tombstones, illuminated by the flames of countless candles, in seemingly endless rows.

Without needing to light his wand, Harry found his way through the graves. He did not need to look for the graves he wanted to visit – he had been there before, every Halloween night in fifteen years.

A tombstone of white marble seemed to glow in front of him in the darkness. The stone seemed to reflect the light of the candle, flickering in the slight breeze, and without reading the words engraved upon it appeared in his mind.

_James Potter, born 27 March 1960, died 31 October 1981_

_Lily Potter, born 30 January 1960, died 31 October 1981_

_The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death._

"I'm here", Harry said, kneeling in front of the grave. The heavy weight that had seemed to press on his chest before was lifted. Being here, at his parents' grave, in the night of their death, meant more to him than he could express in words. He could not explain it, but he _knew, _without understanding, that it was necessary for him to be here now. It was like closing a circle, putting an end to something that was unfinished.

They had died to save him, thirty-one years ago, and they had come to accompany him when he had expected to die to save his friends, and those fighting against Voldemort. He did not need to see their grave to be with them, but in this special night it simply felt _right_.

He did no longer miss them or regret their death – one day, he knew, he would join them.

"Thanks, Mum and Dad", he whispered, turning to face the grave next to his parents'.

It was a simple grave, without unnecessary decoration or flowers, but it did not seem uncared for. A single, white lily sprouted on it.

Like in so many years before, Harry read the dark letters engraved in the pale and simple stone.

_Severus Snape_

_born 9 January 1960, died__ July 1997  
_

_True Love Stories Never Have Endings  
_

Severus Snape. For most of his life, throughout his whole time at Hogwarts School, Harry had hated Snape. He had hated him because of the unfair treatment he had given Harry, the many hours of detentions spent with him, the points taken from Gryffindor without reason. He had hated him because his father and his godfather had hated him. He had hated him, finally, because he had considered Snape a coward who had betrayed them all to Voldemort. He had hated him, loathed him and, given the chance, wanted to kill him.

And Harry had realized that he had been wrong, during all that time. Reading Snape's name now did no longer make him think of horrible potions lessons, of dark, tunnel like eyes burning into his.

He saw a small boy with black, greasy hair, beaming at the red-headed girl sitting next to him; he saw his eleven-years-old self, desperately trying to stay on a bucking broomstick, and the teacher with the hooked nose, whispering counter-jinxes to save him, and who, even years after he had lost his love, still performed a patronus in the form of a doe.

Severus Snape had, for sure, not been a saint. He had tried his best to give Harry a hard time and definitely done a good job at this, Harry thought with a grim grin.

He had been a man who had done grave mistakes and who had paid for them by loosing the only person he had ever loved, in all ways it was possible to loose her; and finally by giving his life, trying to avenge her death.

Giving Snape his final resting place at the side of the one woman he had loved his entire life, at the side of Lily Evans, was something that had given a strange comfort and a kind of peace to Harry, who had been sorry that in life they had never made up. It felt _right_, that now, in death, his parents and Snape were united.

Harry's knees were getting cold, and it was uncomfortable to sit on the ground like this. He got up and, having a last look at the graves, turned to leave. Maybe he had never liked Snape. But he could not help admiring his courage and his devotion, and knew that his mother would have been proud of him.

"Thank you, Professor", he whispered into the darkness, and when he left the graveyard, he felt at peace with his past, glad to know that he would be expected by his loved ones.


End file.
